About to pull the trigger on an Apex...what do you wish you knew before you got yours?

[DLHDesign]

;-)

Note that if you're making your own holder (which is - I agree - rather easy), the temp probe requires a larger hole than all the others. If you've got the full gambit of probes, there will be three "small" holes and one larger one.

Yeah; away from bubbles. Most of the probes are open-ended at the bottom and can trap air inside them, which will throw off their reading. You want them in a reasonably high flow area, but not near any kind of cascade of water.

 

[tiggs]

The best advice I can give is to go slow and test everything to verify it's doing what you want it to before setting it up on your tank. The logs are your friend, because they'll tell you if it's doing what you've tried to program it to do. In fact, I've seen a few people set everything up completely separate from their tanks at first and stuck the probes in a vase of old tank water. By doing this, they were able to get their outlets programmed, test their coding, and get used to the interface before anything of value was on the line. After a few days of tinkering, they felt much more comfortable.

On the financial savings side of things, Craigslist can be an absolute gold mine for lightly used modules for significant savings. Also, shorter Aquabus cables are literally just USB cables, so the 2-for-$5 cables from Amazon work just as well as the Aquabus cables from Neptune. An important thing to point out though is that this ONLY APPLIES TO USB CABLES 15FT OR LESS. Any standard USB cable longer than 15 ft will be an active cable with a signal amplifier and won't work along with a decent probability of causing damage. If you need an Aquabus cable longer than 15 ft, you have to either get it from Neptune or there are a few third parties that make longer Aquabus cables to Neptune's standard.

 

[Flexin]

I think the thing I am most nervous about is how to do all the programming.

At this point, all I want it to do is control my dosing pump for my two part. My lights are self sufficient (via the AI Prime app), and I don’t have a ton of equipment. I do have a sump fan that I will hook up to turn on if temp ever gets above my range. That and controlling my heater.

Admittedly, it will be nice to have a feeding button hahah. Right now I have all my pumps on a power strip that I just flick off when feeding corals. I always set an alarm on my phone to remind me to turn it back on.

Admittedly, the controller world is foreign to me and intimidating, but I am stoked at the arrival of the trident.

Thanks for helping me out. I am sure I’ll be needing help moving forward!

There is a tool to help you with basic programs. Also, there is a Neptune community via the Neptune site. People post code there and they have been helpful. I have two tanks on one Neptune classic. I easily was able to leave for two weeks and take care of things. Glad I got it.

 

[Bill_Moorman]

And s*** just got real!

 

[radiata]

Gee Bill... I was just about to leave you a requested comment, and voila, there's a pic of your Apex. Congratulations, and enjoy!

 

[Bill_Moorman]

Gee Bill... I was just about to leave you a requested comment, and voila, there's a pic of your Apex. Congratulations, and enjoy!

Haha thank you!!

Still post your comment! I Am learning so much!

 

[Joshua Kerstetter]

Hopefully you didn't get too far into it yet, best of luck. I watched alot of the official Neptune You tube videos, and one thing I can't stress enough. MOUNT IT FIRST. Don't attempt to start plugging things in, move it around, then drop it in your sump. Plan your cabling ahead of time. I didn't, then had alot of issues with my salinity probe. I ended up moving it at least 3 times. Still not happy with it, but its the best it can be until I rebuild my sump and completely move things around, and then build a nice box for it. Like all networking equipment, Wire it. Use the tasks function in fusion for everything you can. Name your outlets first! then program. There's tons of things I came across when setting mine up.

 

[Bill_Moorman]

Well it’s all set up and wired!

Things I learned along the way that I didn’t expect/know:

Buy a probe holder with your apex order. I didn’t realize it didn’t come with one. I ordered this one: Innovative Marine Custom Cradle - Nano https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01B6ROUJ2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_LQ-pBb3KCZP7V

Now the issue is this only holds three probes. Didn’t realize I needed one that holds four of them. I’ve got pH, ORP and Salinity in the holder and temp in the return chamber of my sump. No biggie.

Wish I would have known ahead of time NOT to get the salinity probe WET before calibrating it. It says dry the probe, which I didnt understand, so I dried it and put it in the solution before hitting next. It takes a reading dry first and then once it’s in the solution it calibrates

I’ve recalibrated three times and I still have inaccurate readings. It’s showing 43.7 ppt even though I know it’s 35 via my calibrated refractometer. Been on the phone with apex and still doesn’t read correctly. Apparently MANY people have issues with this probe and it’s the most expensive one to replace.

Fallback means when the brain disconnects from the EB, what is the state of the outlet.

Set is what is the initial state (on or off) when connected.

Wishlist:

Apex needs to update their manual. The only one is from 2014.

I also wish they would include simple programs for all of the equipment. Obviously I can search it, but can’t they give an example?

AI Prime HDs aren’t Apex controllable. Hear they are coming out with that soon though.

Here is what everything looks like set up.

And a FTS just for good measure: